Uzbek Head Ornaments from the Collection of the Náprstek Museum

Abstract Jewellery occupied an important place in the various life stages of Central Asian women. Individual jewels that formed sets depending on which parts of the body they were worn on had in a steady form and a particular meaning in the past. Most of the items of jewellery were designed to decorate the upper half of the body, and among the most numerous sets there was a set of head ornaments. These were mainly various types of diadems, paired and individual pendants that were attached to the headdress or to the hair and, last but not least, earrings of various shapes and sizes. The collections of the Náprstek Museum of Asian, African and American Cultures feature a set of head ornaments from Uzbekistan dating back to the late 19th and early 20th century when the jeweller’s creations of the region were still of high quality. The set is represented by jewellery of three local styles – Samarkand, Bukhara and Tashkent.